She's Giving Me The Evil Eye
by swisstony
Summary: Nathan Barely fic...How Dan ended up with a Daughter and jumped out of a window...Alternative Uni...Dan/Jones...Dan/OC
1. Chapter 1

**This is the first story I have posted on here in a long time...I'd love to know what people think: D I know it's a Nathan Barely fic, but I hope that doesn't put people off...**

**Dan/Jones...Dan/OC...**

**I don't own this ; D**

_Thirteen Years Earlier..._

It's four o'clock in the afternoon, and so far he has written a grand total of six words.

Six words.

But they aren't complete, in fact, in truth he has only actually managed to write three letters today, everything else has just been constant re-writes and revisions.

The panic grips him. It closes around his chest like the tightest of vices. He feels the beads of sweat form across his contorted brow.

_He's lost it._

He tries to steady his nerves, which are already frayed almost to the point of insanity, by taking a deep drag from the cigarette that hangs limply from the corner of his mouth.

The back of his throat tingles and burns, and he feels the sliver of smoke roll across the course, slightly coated lining of his tongue. He holds his breath, staring at the flickering curser dancing in front of him. From this he envisages only two possible outcomes, either he will die, or he will write something.

In the end he gives up on both, and inhales with a gasp.

Apart from the low hum of his computer, the room is quite. It's the sort of quite that only exists on Friday afternoons, when the whole world seems trapped in a hermetically sealed bubble on the other side of the living room window.

The sun streams through the net curtains, irritating the back of his neck and causing pain to radiate across the front of his scull.

He's still too hung over the think about doing any real work, who is he trying to kid?

His small gaze shifts around the empty space, answering his own question.

The doorbell suddenly buzzes.

He stops trying to start, and stands up welcoming any distraction. At this point he'll even take a leaflet.

As he makes his way from the living room to the front door he realises that he hates this flat. He commits the thought silently to memory, and opens the door.

_She_ is standing there.

_She _is standing there, in front of him, _She _is standing there on the cracked black and white titles, which make up the incline of his doorstep.

"Alright, Danny."

Everything around him seems to grind to a stuttering halt. Over her shoulder he notices a school boy on a _BMX _isfrozen mid-wheely.

He blinks, and the world floods back in on him.

"Dan."

_She _says his name again, but this time her smile is forced, stretched to tightly across her face to be natural.

Briefly he thinks about closing the door, that maybe he could just hide until _She _goes away. He wonders if he could do it, and along those lines he thinks about what might be her response.

He can't help but be curious as to why _She _is there, because the last time he checked they'd said everything that there had been left for them to say.

Maybe that was where his words had gone?

"Can I come in then?"

_She _asks, he can clearly hear the nervous note in her voice. He watches her as _She _tucks a stray fly-away strand of curly golden blonde hair behind her ear.

"Umm, _yes_, Kate, yes."

_Kate_, her name feels strange, and heavy in his mouth. It hasn't been that long since he's used it, since he's spoken to her, it could only have been about three or four months, but already it's stopped fitting.

Still Kate is better than a leaflet.

He steps aside, and she brushes neatly over the threshold.

Once she's inside, and the door is once again closed behind them he does his best impression of trying not to see her.

"You look, well."

He frowns at himself, at how much he suddenly sounds like his Mother. He's lying, because she doesn't really look well at all, she looks sort of faded, like a dead butterfly trapped on a windowsill. It's London, London washes people out, London has washed him out, it's given him premature crows feet, and heart palpitations.

Kate makes a noise of non-commitment.

"So, this is where you're living?"

Her tone of voice clearly betrays her feelings. And for the first time he hears her accent, he's never noticed it before, it makes him wince, because now he can hear his own.

He's just a boy from the provinces.

She can't glow here, nothing real or natural can glow here. The sunshine of a dozen patchwork fields plays over her features. Back in the countryside is where she belongs.

"Ummm, yeah, _yes_."

The next moment passes in a blur of complete confusion. He doesn't know why he does it, but the next thing he knows it that he is gripping her by the tops of her arms, and planting a kiss against the side of her mouth.

Kate doesn't move, she just stands there rigid.

He lets her go, and backs away.

"I'm sorry, I didn't..."

He shifts awkwardly from foot to foot. What he wants to say is that he has absolutely no idea of how to deal with this situation, he can't even identify if it is an actual situation. She's not screaming, or crying, or throwing herself at him.

_So what is this?_

"It's alright Dan, it's fine."

Kate reaches out, resting her small hand lightly across his frayed sleeve. He glances down at her, and she rewards him with a thin grin of reassurance.

"It's fine, honestly, you're allowed to touch me Dan. Jesus..."

She breaks off into a chuckle, her green eyes flashing. He remembers that look, how it use to pickle his skin with goosebumps.

"I know, but I,"

Kate never lets him finish any sentence, she doesn't start now.

"_Daniel_."

She suddenly adopts the tone of voice of a maiden Aunt.

A sputter of laughter escapes his throat.

"This really is a nice hallway? Who would have thought, that you'd end up living in such a nice hallway? After you moved down here, I sort of pictured you in more cardboard box based habitation."

Her left eyebrow quirks upwards slightly, it's an invitation, she wants to come all the way inside, she probably wants to sit on the sofa.

He pauses, this is an old game, and it won't be over until one of them gives in, and of course it will be him. He tries to lose with as much dignity that nature has afforded him. He pushes the living room door open, and he tries not to see that her eyes never leave his face.

He coughs, and ushers her inside the next small room, which serves as his living room, dining room, and kitchen.

It is like seeing it for the first time, all over again, that stark little room with its nicotine stained walls, and barest sticks of cheap furniture.

"Do you want a drink?"

He crosses the entire space in three paces, reaching the fridge he pulls out two cans of medium strength larger. Kate's wide eyes narrow slightly in the direction of the can that is meant for her.

"It's a bit early for me. But, I'd murder a tea if you're still offering."

He puts her can back in the fridge, and flips the switch on the kettle, dragging a chipped mug across the work surface.

He sees her outline perching on the arm of the sofa.

"What are you doing here?"

The question is addressed to the mug, and the tea bag sat inside.

Kate makes a humming noise, he can tell she's wrestling with a thought.

"When I was on the train, I was thinking about what I was going to say when you asked me that. The whole journey, I was thinking, and thinking. In the end I decided I was going to lie."

He's not really sure if she's grasped that concept properly.

"And the lie is?"

Kate giggles for no reason, unsettling his already jangled nerves.

"Oh, I'm seeing some friends from Uni, I was in the area and I thought I'd drop in."

The kettle reaches a screeching crescendo, coming to a boil.

"And the truth is?"

He hears her exhale, she sounds as if she is deflating.

"I came to see you."

He silently digests her answer, stirring it around with the tea.

It makes him sort of happy, the idea that Kate has come all that way just for him. He does still like her in his own way, as much as he can ever bring himself to like another human being. And they've got the added bonus of a long, complicated and involved relationship. She knows exactly how little to expect from him. Before he left for London, he asked her to come with him, she is the only person he could really ever imagine himself able to share a life with. He knows it's not the same for her, Kate's got options, she's just the right side of unconventional, and not a complete nutcase fuck-up like him.

"Right."

Kate turned his offer down, in hindsight he probably shouldn't have delivered it in a drunken grunt. Although deep down in the thing he uses instead of a functioning human heart he knows that the sticking point was London itself. Kate spent her three years of University in London, while he'd been stuck in the county of their birth.

He's certain that if he'd asked her to follow him anywhere else, even to the very end of the world, she would. Just not to London. And there is nowhere else in the world that he can possibly exist except London.

So, that's the bloody big Bluebottle in the _Viks. _

He hands Kate her scalding brew, and she accepts it with a teasing wink.

"Mmm, you always did make a nice cuppa."

His grip tightens around the chill of his larger can, and he decides that he should defiantly do some more speaking.

"I'm not going back."

He tries to keep the desperate tone from his voice. Still drinking, she nods quietly.

Now that his statement of defiance is safely out there, he feels secure enough to pull at the ring pull, he takes a long deep swig.

"_I'm pregnant."_

He chokes suddenly, the beer escaping from his mouth and nose, hitting Kate square in the face.

"NO!"

He coughs desperately, gasping for breath.

He feels as if his fledging life is suddenly crumpling around his ears like soggy cardboard.

"Have you done this to trap me?"

His paranoia has gotten the better of him. Kate's dripping face freezes.

"You absolute fucking bastard!"

A mixture of venom, and disbelief escape through tightly clenched teeth. She glares at him as she struggles with the woollen fabric of her oversized cardigan, shrugging it off her shoulders she rubs it roughly over her face.

"Well, have you?"

They've never had an argument, things have never been this serious between them before.

"_Yes! Yes! _I decided to get pregnant to trap you. I was so devastated when you said you were moving away, that I thought _fuck_, I know what I'll get myself all nice and up the duff, and then _Dan_ will have to take that job on the local paper! I've even picked us out one of those _'new builds'_ on the estate behind the train station. _Fuck!"_

Kate's tirade ends with a strangled sob, her chin bobs and wobbles with the effort of trying not to cry.

"_Fuck off_, you selfish fucking twat, get some perspective!"

Perspective suddenly hits him between the eyes in the form of a cushion.

"_Ow!"_

He yelps wounded, as the edge of the zip connects with his forehead. He feels the sudden sting of heat from the broken skin.

For no other reason that he doesn't know what else to with his cumbersome body he flops down on the sofa, behind her. The upholstery surrounding him smells like stale nicotine, and damp. His head lolls limply against his chest.

"I hope you've lost an eye, you complete shit!"

He can tell from the tone of Kate's voice that she doesn't mean that.

"You can't be pregnant, we haven't..."

He swallows thickly, deciding to have another bash at absorbing the unfolding horror of the situation.

"...I haven't seen you in months, you can't be pregnant."

What he is really attempting to say in the most diplomatic of ways, and failing miserably at, is that it can't be his baby.

"No, you haven't seen me in _three months_, Dan! And I haven't slept with anyone else since then, so this baby is either yours, or we all best get ready for the second-fucking-coming!"

He stares at her back, her shoulders slightly hunched, she seems smaller somehow, even though he is closer to the ground than her sprawled out across the manky cushions.

"Do you want some money?"

He says without vetting a single word before they fly out of his mouth. A second to late he realises that if Kate agrees to take the twenty pound note he's been hoarding for days he'll barely be able to feed himself.

"What, _why_?"

She shoots him a confused glance from over her left shoulder.

"Well, for you know."

He makes some sort of rudimentary movement with his hands, but he's got no clear idea of what he's trying to articulate with the aid of mime.

"If that's meant to be an abortion you can forget it, I'm a Catholic."

His brow suddenly furrows.

"Since, _when_?"

He asks, losing sight of the real point of the conversation in the first place.

"Since _forever_. I've always been a Catholic, _you _know I've always been a Catholic! I went to a Catholic primary school, you know all this."

He wonders at what stage he ever lead her to believe that he was the sort of person who cared, or worse even notices such things as his sort-of-on-off girlfriend's affiliation to any particular religious grouping.

It goes quiet for a bit. The only sounds in the room are a mixture of harsh breathes, and the distant ticking of an unseen clock. The sun passes behind a cloud, and he realises that the day must now be passing, time is skipping on ahead of him. He wants to trap this moment, he wants to lock it away somewhere dark, and never have to...

"I need a cig."

He says, but doesn't move. His small dark gaze drifts across the room, searching, coming to rest eventually on one of the many overflowing ashtrays, which are dotted around the flat. He eyes the remnants of the cigarette he had been previously chewing on, burnt down to nothing all that is left is the stub.

"Can I use your bathroom?"

Lost in a bubble of his own thoughts, he only distantly notes the sound of Kate's voice.

"_Dan_, can I use your bathroom?"

This time he hears her, because she punctures his reserve with a seriously hard pinch on his arm.

"_Why?"_

He recoils from her touch, wondering when exactly she became so violent, the velvet of her fingers so spiky.

"Because it took me around six _bloody _hours to get here, I had to change trains three _fucking _times, you spat beer in my face, and now I want a shower."

Her voice is prickly, and full of irritation, it does a good impression of articulating audibly how he feels on the inside. Kate climbs off the arm of the sofa, and without adding anything else she slips off the long flowery summer dress she's wearing, the fabric pools around her heavy black leather _DR Martin's_. He wonders silently if this is some new game, one he hasn't encountered before, one they have never played. The question of what sort of reaction she wants rolls around his head, while his eyes flick over her form. Kate doesn't look pregnant, she's still as thin and gawky as she was the last time he saw her in her mismatched underwear. Most of her rib cage is still on display, seeming to threaten at any moment to burst through her skin. She doesn't flinch under his eye, he wouldn't like it if she did.

"It doesn't work."

"A bath, then."

Kate counters, and then sets off in search of the bathroom leaving the room. He doesn't follow her, he decides that it's probably for the best if he just sits quietly on the sofa, and has a smoke for a bit.

He waits a good half an hour until he starts hovering around the bathroom door listening to the silence.

"Are you coming in then, or what?"

Kate's voice rings out, he paces for a few moments longer debating with himself, and then finally ducks his head inside. The heat from the steam hits him first.

Kate flashes him a tired, sympathetic smile.

He sits on the floor, resting his back against the door, stretching his long legs out in front of him.

"So, is that it then?"

She scratches the end of her nose.

"Umm, yes, I think so."

The grey, silver clouds of water pool around her chin, Kate's cheeks are flushed a dark pinkish hew from the raised temperature. He can only make out the vaguest outline of her body.

"I don't want to be a Dad."

"I know."

The thin line across his mouth tightens. Is that all there is to say? It's not enough. He wants more, he wants Kate to say something, to use some magic combination of words that will slot everything back into place. _Can you talk a thing out of existence? Can you unmake it with words?_

"I can't be anyone's Father, I'm barely a human-being."

Kate's silent agreement screams across the room at him, he feels as if he can read her mind. He wishes he'd been half as good at reading the instructions on her uterus.

A fancy dress party, he's always hated social gatherings especially ones that involve people he's been a teenager in front of, but anything had been preferable to spending the night on the sofa sandwiched between his parents listening to them extolling the virtues of their new caravan, and the holiday they were planning to go on in Rill with the next door neighbours.

He hadn't been expecting to see her, he hadn't really thought about her at all for well over a year. In fact the only thing that had concerned him was how many sausage rolls he could stuff into his pockets without being noticed, and how many beers he could sink before he considered euthanasia as his only viable option for escape.

Of course when Kate had swam into his vision a few moments later dressed as the _Julie Newmar _version of _Catwoman _from the really rubbish _Batman _television series,resplendent in a brunette wig, and kitten ears clipped to the sides of her head, she'd managed to make even such a ridiculous costume look sexy.

_Sexy, _he feels his face twitch repulsed by the word.

After a brief banal conversation about how shit the music was _(Cornershop_ played on a mind jittering loop), and what a knob the host had been at school, this baby, which had so rudely invaded his life had been conceived on the floor of said-knob's bathroom.

"I thought,"

He clears his throat, running his fingers over the rough stubble of his chin.

"I thought you said, you were on the pill."

His small eyes widen as the last word leaves his mouth.

"I was!"

Kate's voice is once again filled with the heavy notes of raw indignation. Leaning forward, she turns on the hot tap, the pipes vibrate, and squeal against her demands.

"I was, I just I didn't know...I went for a curry with this girl from work,"

"A curry, what was it laced with my sperm?"

She glares at him, trickles of water rolling down from the smooth surface of her forehead.

"Can you shut the fuck up, and let me finish! I went for this really dodgy curry, I was off sick from work for most of the week, and then on that weekend we shagged, and I thought it would be fine, I didn't realise that the contraceptive pill completely falters at the fence of sickness and diarrhoea."

Kate turns off the tap, and with it everything he wants to say dries up on the tip of his tongue. He stares at his hands, already his fingers are itching for another cigarette.

"I can do this, Dan."

He's not sure who she is trying to convince out of the pair of them, he's never heard her sound so unsure of anything before, but then again this is a big something, which the interplay between them has never extended before to accommodate.

He doesn't want to say the sentence, which is pounding away in his head ever since Kate finished hers'. He doesn't want to say it because, he knows how it sounds, and he hates himself for it.

"What about me?"

Kate lets her arm drape across the chipped rim of the beige bath, she stretches out her hand for him and without the aid of a cigarette to occupy him, he threads his fingers easily through her splayed digits. Her skin is slippery, and puckered against his rough, calloused touch.

"It will be alright, Danny I promise. I'm not expecting anything from you, I know what you're like."

He raises one eyebrow briefly, wondering if he should take moderate offence at her insinuation.

"Oh come off it, you admitted it yourself you're useless."

Kate's nose crinkles with her giggles, he manages a half hearted smile in response.

"Do you think I'm an _idiot_?"

She stops smiling at his question. He asks it because, well because since moving to London he's been plagued by the fear that he actually is an _idiot_, a massive one in fact.

"No, no of course not, I'd never have the baby of an _idiot_."


	2. Chapter 2

**Thank you to **_**Chalcedony Rivers **_**for the lovely review. **

**I don't own this, but I do hope you enjoy.**

_Six Months Later..._

After a long search around the various hospital corridors, a concerned nurse eventually leads him to a small private room located just off the maternity wing.

Kate looks pale when he sees her; he's also surprised to note that her unruly curls have been tamed into a sleek bob. She's got grown up hair. Actually he's not really surprised at all by her hair he's just trying desperately not to notice the fluffy bundle neatly tucked into the crook of her arm.

So _that _is it, _that's _his child.

"Alright Dan, so you managed to find _us_ in the end."

He manages a nervous twitch of his lips. Hunched he hovers in the doorway, his forehead knotted in a tight frown.

"Claire told me you had a rough time of it."

He stops himself from finishing his own sentence.

"Yeah, well you could say that."

Kate snickers back in response.

"But you're alright, right, now?"

He shuffles inside the room, closing the door behind him.

"Well, the infection is finally gone, so they should be letting me out in the next couple of days, which is perfect timing really, because if I have to stay in here any longer I will kill."

Now that he's closer, he notes that she does in fact look a little _'stir-crazy'_ and frayed around the edges.

He feels unbelievably guilty, because he should have made the effort to see her before this. The call had come from Claire, he was as usual suffering the after effects from another binge, and so it had taken him a moment or two to locate the telephone, which he'd had newly reconnected after finally selling an article to a magazine.

Claire sounded characteristically pissed off, but there was something else as well, a note he hadn't heard in her voice since she'd been five or six and she'd demanded to share his bed because the old tree, which their Father had eventually felled, had been scratching against her bedroom window, Claire had been frightened. When she'd told him she was in the hospital, his thoughts had admittedly run to their parents, forgetting all about Kate and the baby.

His sister had called him to let him know that Kate was going into surgery for an emergency caesarean, and that the baby he'd spent the last six months trying, and failing miserably not to think about had been in serious foetal distress.

When the conversation had ended, he'd found himself slumped on the sofa staring into a void. The thing that had shocked him most was how he had felt, the fact that it had made him feel anything at all had been a surprise. He'd been use to feelings of inadequacy, and frustrated impotence, but the thought that he should have been there, or at least be doing something other than just sitting on his backside had twisted just as sharp as any blade into his guts.

He'd gone for a walk, no not really a walk, a grim pilgrimage. He'd pounded around the streets until the early hours of the morning, cursing the fact that it had all been happening so far away, that Kate and _their _baby could have been dying, or already long dead. She shouldn't have had to face all that alone, none of it had ever seemed fair, but especially not that.

His feet had led him home to find the red light flashing on the answer machine he'd inherited from the previous tenants. He'd taken a deep breath, and pushed the button.

"Sit down."

His legs give out from underneath him at the sound of her command, and he finds himself awkwardly perched on the lip of the hospital bed.

"Do you want to see _her_?"

He stops breathing, and feels the walls start to close in around him. The tips of his fingers are tingling, he's certain he's about to have a stroke, a panic attack, or failing that simply pass out.

His daughter's face floats under his eyes, she might as well be a snapshot of him as a newborn. He notes how pink she is.

"_She's_..."

He can't finish the sentence, because he doesn't know how to articulate everything that _She _is. The word _terrifying_ does a quick lap of the inside of his scull.

"Has she got a name?"

He flinches first lifting his gaze back up to meet Kate's.

"Annabelle."

_Annabelle._

He lets the fact that he has a daughter, and her name is Annabelle sink in. A bubble of relief floods up inside his chest. Unconsciously the baby's name has been taken up an excessive amount of space that he would usually engage in starving, and trying to overcome another bout of stifling writer's block. He knows Kate well enough to have been able to reassure himself that she would never lumber the baby with a ridiculous moniker like Lavender or Polaris, but even so he'd felt concerned enough to monitor alarming trends towards classic idiot names such as Ashley, Tyler, Brittany and most vomit inducing of all Jordan.

The more the name filters down through his consciousness, the more he likes the way it sounds. He's also reassuringly certain that no _idiot _in the history of idiocy has ever been dubbed an Annabelle.

"Annabelle Claire Elliot."

His eyebrow quirks skyward at the inclusion of his sister's name.

"What, don't look at me like that Dan, she was really excited, what could I do."

Kate fails to disguise her rather sheepish defence of over sentimentality.

"And anyway, it was either _Claire _or Polaris Lavender."

She smirks, and he hopes that Annabelle is a crier.

"Alright Annabelle,"

He nods tentatively in Annabelle's direction, afraid that his expression is a ridiculously gooey as Kate's.

He decides to start again realising that his first words to his daughter should be something bloody spectacular. Nothing comes to him.

"Hey Annabelle,"

He fears suddenly that all his future interactions with the bundle will be as strained.

"Annie."

Kate quickly takes over, her voice cutting through the gaping void of silence. Suddenly all he can think of is _Annie Walker_ standing matronly and stoic at the bar of _The Rover's Return_.

"This is Dan,"

She addresses their daughter with a soft cooing lilt.

"...he's your..."

"DAN. I'm your Dan."

He jumps in quickly to finish Kate's sentence. It's not that he doesn't want to be singled out as Annabelle's Father, it's just that he doesn't want to be introduced to her like this, he's got holes in his clothes, the sole on his left battered trainer has been threatening to slip loose for weeks, and he hasn't shaved. _He should have at least shaved._

Kate doesn't bother to correct him.

"You can hold her if you want."

He shakes his head, because his finger nails are dirty, and five minutes before he entered the hospital he'd just finished his fifth cigarette of the morning.

Immediately Annabelle suddenly explodes into howling, proper ear-splitting baby wails. He's gripped with the fear that the tears have sprung from him, and his apparent rejection of her. His face obviously betrays his inner turmoil.

"It's alright Dan, she's just hungry."

Kate never one to stand on ceremony worked her left breast out from under the constraints of her t-shirt, and Annabelle begins to nosily feed. His mouth feels as dry as a sandpit.

"_Wow_..."

He makes a laboured attempt at swallowing.

"You just got your tit right, out there."

"Oh sorry, did you want to do it?"

Kate laughs, her giggles giving away to soft humming.

He listens to her for a few moments before breaking off, and asking "Why are you humming the theme to _The Third Man_?"

"It was the only tune I could remember all the way through, I think she likes it now, anyway."

The bridge of Kate's nose wrinkles, and without considering anything for a second he leans across planting the briefest of kisses on the tip.

He feels her eyes pressing into him, those green orbs un-blinking, un-flinching.

"Dan."

He quickly moves back, his cheeks are glowing he can feel the heat.

"Dan."

Kate is trying her hardest to anchor him, to commutate with him, but his eyes are everywhere else.

He can't do this, he doesn't need to look at her to know what she's asking. He loathes how much he wants to, the temptation of how easy it might all be if he just answered her silent question with a simple _yes...I really, really do. _He's under no illusions of what a self-centred, selfish shit he is, but even he couldn't do that to Kate or Annabelle, he could never inflict himself permanently on them.

_He forgot._

_And then he remembers._

He remembers suddenly the small black velvet box the one, which has been uncomfortably jabbing into him through the fabric of his jeans pocket since he sat down. The box that his Mother forced him to bring with him, all the while telling him what a pretty girl Kate was, how much she had always liked her, and that he should make an honest woman out of Kate before she'd had a chance to wriggle out of the keep net with her only Grandchild.

"_Girls like that one, don't come along all the time, and they especially don't for boys like you, Daniel." _

Had been his Mum's exact sentence, for once he didn't think to correct her.

Unceremoniously he pulls the box out, and deposits it on the sheet next to her, and waits.

"Are you asking me to marry you?"

"NO!"

He winces at the apparent harshness of his reply, he can only imagine what this must look like from the outside looking in.

"No. I wanted to bring you something for the...for Annabelle, I wasn't sure what financial situation you're going to be in, and I want to provide something."

Kate seems mesmerized by the object, she stares at it as if it was some sort of deadly weapon, a threat to the normality she has managed to claw from the jaws of dysfunction.

"It's _beautiful_."

Her voice is sad, and after she's spoken there are no other words, the world is suddenly devoid of syntax and the only sounds that exist are made up of breathing, and Annabelle's soft, wet repetitive suck.

"It was my Gran's engagement ring,"

He speaks feeling the desperate need to fill the sudden void of space with something other than just his own continual existence.

"...it was meant for my Mum, but she's never liked it. I think those are real diamonds, although they could just be doing good impressions."

Kate tilts her head to one side as she quietly contemplates him.

"I got you something as well."

She motions awkwardly in the direction of the small white plastic bedside table next to her. It takes him a few moments to react, but when he does eventually open the cupboard nestled inside the cyclically severe piece of furniture he finds a rather crumpled up carrier bag.

"I like the wrapping."

"It's a mobile phone."

Kate quickly informs him, spoiling any hit of surprise that the large lump of alien technology he is holding limply in his hand could be comprised of anything other than a mobile phone.

"Just keep it charged, I'll call you _if _I need you."

The resigned tone of her exhale gets lost somewhere amidst one wide yawn, and then another.

"I should go."

He says to the as yet still unopened carrier bag, before climbing back off the edge of the hospital bed.

Part of him, the part that is always so unsatisfied with the measly portions he feels life has served him wants to just leave, but the other part, the bit he hardly ever listens to anymore can't resist another glance over his shoulder at Annabelle, _his daughter_.

"You are going to come back aren't you? You need to say a better good bye that that, _Daniel_."

Clutching the plastic handles of the bag, he swiftly pulls out a packet of cigarettes from the hole ridden back pocket of his jeans.

"Yeah, I'm just going out for a fag."

He shakes the half empty packet as if to demonstrate his intent, and Kate chortles.

It's only half a lie, because as he hot foots it across the car park making his escape from the place as fast as possible he is puffing on a fag.


	3. Chapter 3

Dan has been calling her today.

Three times the unmistakable combination of his name and number has flashed up on the display of her mobile, and three separate times she has simply chosen to ignore him.

She feels it again, her phone buzzes away unseen in the pocket of her blazer. The number of times Dan has ever called her she can count exactly on one hand, minus the thumb.

She shuffles her way into the kitchen, not bothering to pick her feet up properly. She pulls open the fridge door, her face brightening at the contents, suddenly glad that she came home for lunch. She decides as she pulls out a packet of sausage rolls, and a half full bottle of _diet Pepsi _that she just won't bother going back, she's more than happy to sacrifice an afternoon of _Jarndyce and Jarndyce _in favour of some _Sky Plussed Glee. _

With her hands full, she rolls her tongue over across the raised, and swollen skin of her mouth ulcer making it sting under her probing. She presses down on the lump of warm flesh until her phone finally stops vibrating. She tries not to think about motivation, because she already knows exactly what it is, that it is born out of some vague, and in her opinion deserved feelings of guilt, and of course inebriation. She can almost hear the slurred tone of Dan's voice, and it will be slurred because it always has been since the very first time she heard him speak.

She lets the fridge door close softly behind her, and rests the bottle of soft drink, and sausage rolls on the decommissioned old butcher's block of a kitchen table. She tugs her still vibrating phone out of her pocket, and then stops.

_Not Dan..._

Dan's number has been replaced by one she has never seen before, and _'anonymous call'_. She knows that Dan is too lazy to bother calling her from another telephone, so this is someone else.

She pauses for a few moments, and then finally answers.

"Hello?"

"_Annabelle?"_

The articulated sound of complete and utter desperation rasps her name back at her.

Annabelle has never heard anyone sound like that before, and she feels embarrassingly naive admitting to herself just how much the sound of such uncontained raw emotion has frightened her.

"_Annabelle, Annabelle?"_

The disembodied male voice repeats again with renewed urgency. Annabelle responds with a weak and rather uncertain sounding _'yes'_.

"Yes."

She answers again, needing to shore up the idea of her identity in her own mind, as much the unseen strangers. Annabelle hears him sigh, down the crackling connection it sounds as if he is trying to finally think of something to say after the build up.

"_You don't know me I'm your Dad's..."_

He pauses over the last part of the sentence, his tongue tripping him up.

"_I'm Dan's friend."_

It occurs to Annabelle that although she doesn't know his name she's more than positive that she can make an accurate guess to the identity of the stranger breathing down the other end of her phone, and more importantly than that the nature of his 'friendship' with Dan.

"Are you Dan's new _boyfriend_?"

It seems strange using the word '_new_' because until about three weeks ago when Dan had decided to unceremoniously turn up at the gates of her school in his old banger, Annabelle hadn't been aware of any '_old_' boyfriends.

"_He told you about me?"_

Annabelle can clearly hear the surprise thick in the voice of the unnamed man.

The feeling of sinking suddenly washes over her. Since the moment she opened her eyes that morning Annabelle has felt it, the dead weight sitting in the pit of her stomach. Something bad has happened, again.

"Has he..."

A deep frown furrows across her smooth forehead as she struggles to finish her question.

"_Dan's fallen out of a window."_

Annabelle lets that sentence settle in for a few minutes

Annabelle waits for the feelings, the ones she knows she should have by the simple laws of biology, but they don't come.

"Is he dead?"

She just says it, says those words as if she's asking if it is raining outside.

_Is he dead?_

Annabelle doesn't mean to be so cold or disconnected, more than anything she would like to _feel_ this moment.

The unnamed man doesn't answer her question immediately.

"_Dan's not dead...he's not dead."_

She wonders briefly, which one of them he is attempting to convince. The tightness, which she hadn't notice before loosens around her chest, and she breathes again. The air rushing down her throat, and into her lungs is soft, and cool.

"_You should come to the hospital, Dan's in a bad way, you should come."_

The unnamed man, or to put a finer point on it _Dan's Boyfriend_ must run out of credit after that because Annabelle can't hear him anymore. She pulls the phone away from the side of her head, and stares blankly at the display confronted by _Robert Patterson's _smiling visage. She doesn't even fancy _Robert Patterson_, one of her friends changed her wallpaper from an image of her hamster Pickles lying face down inside his exercise wheel to the winsome pretend vampire.

"Did he jump?"

Silence greets her question. The thought of what she should do next starts to roll around the inside of her head, bouncing occasionally off the sides of her scull. She's more than certain that the ten pounds she has in the purse buried at the bottom of her school bag isn't going to get her anywhere close to London.

_And she doesn't want to go. _

Annabelle doesn't want to go, she doesn't want to be involved in whatever this is, she has seen her Mum get sucked in by Dan enough over the years not to let it happen to her.

_And if it was really serious her Mum, or her aunty Claire, or her Grandparents, someone else would have told her, anyone other than him._

The front door slams, and Annabelle instantly knows that _now _it is serious.

"Annie!"

The sound of her Mum's voice rings out from the vicinity of the hallway, the unmistakable edge of fear. She hears the familiar sound of rubber squeaking hurriedly against wood, and seconds later her younger brother bursts through the kitchen door.

"Annie, Annie look what I got."

The top of a brown curly head bobs up, and down under her nose trying to attract her attention, which is fixed intently on something else.

Annabelle is waiting.

She's waiting to see the expression on her Mum's face to be her guide, to act as Annabelle's emotional _geiger-counter_. When Annabelle finally sees it, she knows things are very bad, and very real, and her heart starts to pound.

And that this thing has finally actually happened. Without ever needing to articulate it Annabelle knows that this has always been her Mum's secret fear, that Dan would one day just chuck himself off the side of a building, or more accurately as he has done today, out of a window.

She finds it hard to believe that she could be the product of two such melodramatic individuals.

"Mummy."

Annabelle feels her pent up uncertainty suddenly spilling out of her body.

Her Mum's face is three shades paler than usual, and for once, today at least she looks her age, her features drawn tight with stress.

"_Tiger_ darling, why don't you go and choose a DVD for us to watch."

The tone of her Mum's voice jars, too flat and too controlled, even Annabelle's brother seems to notice pausing abruptly from waving his small blue plastic _Stegosaurs_ in the air.

"It's alright _sausage,_"

Their Mum soothes gazing at one of them, but addressing both.

"Annie's going to help me make the lunch, one of your _Doctor Who _discs should still be in the player."

The little boy doesn't wait to be reminded spinning on the heels of his trainers he dashes back out of the kitchen, doing his best impression of _the Tardis' _whooshing engines as he runs.

She wants to chase after him, to be on the other side of the door to be just like her brother. Annabelle was seven when Tiger was born, and in the space of time that it to gestate a normal human baby, and not an Elephant she went from being the centre of the Universe, to her Mother's eldest child. The only hint of jealous she has ever felt towards him stems from the fact that she was the one who was cursed with Dan as her biological Father.

"What's going on, Mummy?"

Annabelle feels herself suddenly enveloped in the warm familiarity of her Mum's arms, she let's her guard slip as she rests her head against her Mum's shoulder.

"Honestly, I don't know."

Annabelle closes her eyes and just breathes as she tries not to think. But the more she tries the more she can't seem to stop herself. The last time she had seen Dan he'd seemed different, happy even, _maybe? _It's hard for Annabelle to judge since she's never seen enough of him to tell one of his moods apart from the other. Dan had sought her out though, it hadn't seemed like her Mum had, had to intervene and twist his arm the way she usually did to get Dan to come and see Annabelle on her birthdays.

For the briefest point in time Annabelle had even managed to fool herself into believing that he'd wanted her blessing, that what she'd thought about him had really mattered.

_He's jumped out of a window. _

A loud voice in the back of Annabelle's head rings out, reminding her with brutal clarity that Dan doesn't care about her, that he's never once considered her wellbeing, her _being _at any point in his life.

_Confused. _

Her brain feels as if it's being eaten up from the inside with muddled confusion, twisting from complete apathy and emptiness to pity and something close to despair. Although she's not entirely sure what despair should really feel like.

In her own darkness, she can see Dan's face, he's not wearing his usual sullen, despondent expression, instead he smiles.

_They've got the same smile._

Annabelle opens eyes, and then dissolves into a sudden stream of unexpected tears.

"Dan's not going to die is he?"

_She's losing something. _

He has called his daughter, _Annabelle_, three times today.

As his glance drops down over the edge of the windowsill he knows he should have made it four.

_The Idiots are winning._

The _Idiots _have won he corrects himself.


	4. Chapter 4

**No Jones in this...: ( But there will be more of him later...lol...**

**Thanks to Hayley for a lovely review; D Missed u sweets...**

All at once there is everything, and nothing.

The pain is immense, but then again in a moment in a blink it's gone.

The waves of reality and pain ebb and flow across his body.

He didn't know dying would be this hard; other people seemed to do it all the time.

Over and over again he sees the pavement spiralling towards his face, the inventible knowledge that he has fucked his last chance away rushing up to meet him.

_Impact. _

The ruminants of the thing he considers to be his life fall around him, and shatter.

_What has he just done?_

Utter disbelief, has he really just jumped out of a window?

He feels himself drifting away from anything close to coherence.

"_Jesus Dan you stupid, stupid shit! What the fuck have you done!"_

He hears his sister Claire's harsh, worried tones, and realises that those are the last words he will probably ever hear again. _They seem apt. _

It feels dark.

Annabelle lies in her bed staring blankly at the outline of her bedroom window, tonight she has decided to leave the curtains open, and now she can clearly see the swollen orb of a full moon.

She manages to avert her eyes, rolling onto her back Annabelle silently gazes up at her bedroom ceiling watching the shadowy patterns of the outside world dance across the plaster. The soft orange glow of the landing light pools in under her closed door illuminating one half of her face.

It only _feels _dark.

Annabelle wonders if there is light where Dan is, in the hospital.

For no other reason than she is sick of lying on her back, and tired of glancing at nothing, without being tired, Annabelle sits up. She gropes across the bottom of her bed, her fingers quickly finding the soft familiar edge of her fluffy dressing gown, pulling the fabric over her shoulders she slips from the warmth of her duvet.

Annabelle stands up, and then stops. She doesn't move, instead she makes a quick visual assessment of the various obstacles that litter her bedroom floor. The first thing Annabelle spots is her hamster Pickles' exercise ball, followed by some discarded glossy magazines, her PE kit, and a number of rumpled items that look like pants and socks in the dim light.

Carefully on the tips of her bare feet she manages to side step every one, eventually making it to the safety of her door. When Annabelle opens it she realises with a burning sensation stinging, and colouring her cheeks that she could have run all the way across the room in platform shoes no-one would have heard her.

The combination of cigarette smoke, and music slowly rolls up the stairs towards her. Forgetting the situation Annabelle rolls her eyes contemptuously at her Mum's choice of _'Old People's Music'_ _Damon Albarn _droning away with the band that he was in before he was in _The Gorillaz. _Still at least it isn't _The Smiths, _nothing could heralded Dan's terminal decline better than _Morrisse_y's warbling.

Her Mum's smoking, Annabelle has only ever seen her Mum in that act twice, and both times were at parties.

Cautiously Annabelle moves down the stairs taking one at a time, until she sits down taking her place in the middle of the staircase.

The living room door is open wide enough for her to see her Mum, who is curled up at one end of the sofa, a cigarette in one hand, and the landline telephone pressed up against the side of her head, in the other. Annabelle presses her forehead against the smooth, cool surface of the wooden banister and just listens to the sound of tears. Like smoking, crying is something Annabelle isn't use to seeing her Mum do.

_The conversation is long since over._

Annabelle briefly considers getting up, and snuggling back under the warmth of her bed covers, but before she has the opportunity to move she hears the unmistakable scraping of a key in the lock of the front door.

"_Katie." _

Her Dad suddenly appears shaking the late night precipitation of the shoulders of his jacket, he doesn't notice Annabelle sitting quietly, and alone.

Her Mum replaces the telephone handset back into its cradle, and stubs out her cigarette, she moves from the sofa out into the hallway where Annabelle watches her Mum wrapping her arms tightly around her Dad's waist.

"Oh."

She hears her exhale shakily. Annabelle realises with a sudden start that she isn't watching the usually interplay between her Mum and Dad, instead she is interloping on the private world of Kate and Simon.

"I'm all wet,"

Her Dad pointed out pulling back slightly from her Mum's desperately tight embrace.

"I don't care."

"Yeah well I do, I'm making you all wet, just let me take off my coat."

Her arms go suddenly slack, Annabelle's eyes follow her Mum as she drifts back into the living room. She can instantly tell that her Dad knows how badly he's just handled the situation; he stands in the hallways for a moment his eyes seemingly fixed on the blank wall ahead of him, before finally slipping out of his jacket hanging it up on the nearby overly cluttered coat stand. Ordinarily the coat stand is one of the things Annabelle's Dad often complains the most about, how most of the coats, scarves, and umbrellas clogging up the hooks haven't been worn or used in months, tonight however he doest bother to even mutter a comment, instead he just tries his best to find a space.

"I didn't expect you back from London tonight."

Somewhere in the process of Annabelle's gaze shift between her Mum, and her Dad she has managed to loose sight of her Mother as she moves deeper into the space of the living room.

"I explained the situation at work, I though you and _Annie_ might need me."

Annabelle flinches nervously at the mention of her name, the overwhelming feeling of suddenly being the most visible spot on the face of the entire planet floods her.

She should go, she knows she should go, but she can't move Annabelle is rooted to the spot.

"We do."

Much to Annabelle surprise her Father makes a snorting sound of derision.

"_Jesus_, Simon please don't start this."

Annabelle hears the clink of glass followed by the slosh of liquid.

"Are you pissed? The kids are in the house, and you're pissed."

"_Fuck off_, I think I'm allowed a drink given the situation. And the children are asleep in the house, so can you _please_ try to contain it to a dull roar."

That's the first time either of her parents have ever sworn in front of her, it sets Annabelle on edge. She's twelve almost thirteen, swearing isn't a massive issue for her in everyday life, but this is different these people are her parents. They never argue, her Mum and Dad are the most sickeningly happy people that have ever happened to exist at the very same time, whenever any of Annabelle's friends stay over its always a bone of contention and mockery, but perhaps they do, maybe the scene half unfolding in front of her is just one of many unseen fights.

Annabelle's Dad speaks again, for all her desperate straining she completely misses the sentence.

"Don't say that, you know that's not true! I don't, I never ever have...how many times do I have to tell you, when are you going to believe me?"

It doesn't take a genius to work out what was at the heart of the sentence Annabelle failed to hear. She has actually often wondered the question herself, if her Mum ever actually loved Dan at some point, they don't seem to have anything in common not that she's ever made an active study of their interactions. Annabelle has noticed however when they are ever forced into the situation of breathing the same oxygen, in the same enclosed space her Mum tends to address Dan the way she used to talk to Tiger when he was a toddler, all upbeat with small words.

Still hovering in the doorway of the living room, Annabelle stares at the back of her Dad's head, from her higher vantage point he seems much smaller, and the suit he's wearing much bigger. He breathes out through his nose, while the nail of his thumb belonging to his left hand picks away at the white gloss paint of the door frame. The tension in the wordless exchange is so thick that Annabelle can almost see it.

"_I know you were with him."_

"What?"

"The day we got married, my Brother said he saw you with Dan, he said you were sitting in that coffee shop, you know the one environmental health closed down because the chief kept wiping his arse on the food."

Annabelle tries her hardest to stifle a giggle, biting down on the soft flesh of the inside of her mouth. She can taste the faint hint of iron ghosting over her tongue.

"Is that really why they closed that place down?"

The sound of revulsion and horror is palpable in her Mother's tone.

"_Yes_, didn't you see it in the paper, there was a two page spread."

The conversational atmosphere serves to settle Annabelle's nerves, this is what she's use to, her parents bickering over three year old content in the local newspaper.

"They use to sell the best apple turnovers."

Annabelle's eyes roll sky ward at her Mum's attempt to tease humour from the situation, it's one of the only things her Mum does that she feels sincerely annoyed by. Annabelle wasn't born a particularly cheerful soul, and as such the very last thing she has ever needed is to be woken up on every single morning before school with her Mum's face smiling away while singing the chorus of the _Eurythmics Must be an angel._

"Anyway, it wasn't like that, Dan just wanted to borrow money. When he noticed my wedding dress didn't exactly have deep pockets he cleared off."

Her Dad slowly wanders away from the shelter of the door frame, as he moves the side of his body gently catches across the doors surface causing it to shift open a little more. From where she is precariously perched Annabelle can now see the reflection of the rest of the interior of the room shining back at her from the mirror above the fireplace. Her Mum has transferred herself from being curled up at the end of the cream coloured fabric sofa closest to the door to being in the exact same position on the battered _Chesterfield_, which is as always in its traditional spot pushed up against the wall. It is out of design and habit rather than poverty that her parents don't have a single stick of furniture that matches.

He takes up the remaining space on the sofa, Annabelle's feels her eyes widen with surprise when she sees him pulling a cigarette free from her Mum's grasp before taking a long obviously satisfying drag on the end.

"_Fuck_."

He frowns resting his head on the scratched and worn green leather, her Mum shuffles closer to him resting her hand lightly against the side of his cheek.

"Si, you have to stop being jealous of him, I'm not in love with Dan. I'm tired of telling you."

"Do you blame me? I mean, I'm out of the country, for what _six months_ and then when I come back you're knocked up with someone else's kid?"

Annabelle feels the invisible barb again pressing into her chest, the sting of rejection. _Someone else's kid_, she's never thought of herself in those terms before, but that's what she is.

"Annie should be mine, I love her so much, you know I always have. Dan has never disserved her, he doesn't disserve either of you."

She notices something twist across her Mother's features, Annabelle feels it passing over her as well on the inside. _Guilt. _They mirror each other's guilt, because they both share combined a sorrow for the much maligned Elephant in the room.

"_I can't change the past."_

He twists the upper half of his body awkwardly, so that the tip of his nose is almost pressed against the temple of her Mum's head.

"I know, look I'm not blaming you,"

Annabelle clearly sees her Mum's expression reflected in the mirror, and she knows that it's not a good look. Her Dad begins to desperately back peddle, noticing too late the massive hole he has managed to fling himself into.

"_Katie, _listen to me. I'm just tired of all this shit, it's been going on for so long now, I don't know, don't you think it might be time to just call it a day? I mean how many times has Dan crawled around on our living room floor so drunk that he thinks he's talking _you _on the phone? He's always had problems _Katie, _you've acknowledged that yourself, maybe it's about time..."

"_I am not going to abandon him."_

Annabelle can feel it all starting up again, this is a machine that apparently never gets tired of chasing its own tail, an argument that never ceases to tie itself up in knots.

"Why?"

All the intimacy suddenly evaporates pushed out by her Father's determination to keep irritating the same old wound. Annabelle can't stand to listen to anymore of this particular conversation, as quietly as she can she makes her way back up the stairs to her bedroom. Climbing back under her now frozen bed covers it only takes a matter of moments before for the first time that night Annabelle falls asleep.

_I'm sorry._

Annabelle opens her eyes, the sun is now streaming through her bedroom window banishing the dark shadows, which had hovered over her the long and fractious night before. _Laura Marling _is singing to her from the speakers of her _Ipod _dock/ alarm clock. Her stomach rumbles along with the chorus, and she's desperate hungry for a boiled egg with white bread soldiers lined up across her plate. Turning her head her sleep addled brain takes few moments to register the time on her alarm clock, as its Friday and a school morning Annabelle usually wakes up at around the 7.30 mark as it gives her just enough time to have a shower, eat her breakfast, and meet her best friend Ellie on the corner of her road before the walk to school. The sequence of florescent green digits that stare back at her fill her with a quick bolt of panic, she's late around two hours late in fact. Even with all the urgency she knows the situation should command Annabelle doesn't move a muscle, instead she lets herself sink deeper into the fabric of her pillow. She hears the light knock on her door, Annabelle knows her Dad will be the one on the other side since he's the only person who ever bothers to ask before stepping into her room.

"Ummm, yeah!"

Her voice sounds oddly squeaky to her own ears. She raises herself up onto her elbows, and flashes her Dad a sleepy smile as he pushes open the door, and rests his shoulder casually on the frame.

"Hello, fluffy head."

Annabelle's eyes flick quickly over him as she tries to detect the change, to see if she can locate the join between the angry, jealous man from the night before, and the one that is smiling down at her now. She doesn't find it instead she notices the small brown paper bag her Dad is clutching in his right had.

"Breakfast."

He winks as he lightly tosses Annabelle the bag, it lands on neatly on the bed next to her. Her stomach grumbles again reminding her just how hungry she is exactly, and she quickly fishes out the _pain au chocolat _that she knows is waiting for her at the bottom.

Annabelle lifts the pastry to her lips taking a bite, the bitter taste of the dark chocolate dies of her tongue, everything feels suddenly different and fuzzy, she doesn't like the new world she seems to have woken up in to.

"I'm really late for school."

She mumbles with her mouthful.

"Na, Mummy and me decided it might be better if you didn't go in today."

Her Dad moves cautiously across the room attempting to hop between the patches of carpet he can see. Having successfully navigated the traitorous passage he sits down on the bed next to her.

"Anyway how fair would it be if I had a good old skive from work, while you had to go to school? I wouldn't be much of a Dad would I?"

Annabelle can tell that it's meant to be a joke, but it doesn't feel very funny in fact all she wants to do now is suddenly start crying. Without thinking she discards her breakfast, and wraps her now idle arms tightly around her Dad's neck.

"_I love you Daddy."_

She whispers into the collar of his shirt. Her Dad squeezes her back tightly, but it isn't enough to reassure her.

"You and Mummy aren't going to get a divorce are you?"

Annabelle slips out of her Father's arms, her large often sad peridot coloured gaze fixes on her Father's face studying his expression intently. What she finds is surprise, and relief spreads over her like the warmest of blankets.

"No of course not, why would you think that Darling?"

The next bit his hard because Annabelle is such a terrible liar, she struggles to pluck an excuse out of the air, and then she suddenly remembers.

"Ellie's Mum and Dad are getting a divorce, I was worried."

He seems to believe her, because the next thing Annabelle knows is that her Dad is smiling.

"Yea, well things are a bit different with Ellie's Mum and Dad."

Her Dad says trying to be tactful, Annabelle is fully aware of 'different' things are between her best friend's parents.

"So, no worrying alright."

He pulls Annabelle forward planting a playful kiss on the top of her fuzzy head.

"You've got almost as much hair as your Mother."

He chuckles teasing her over her sprawling mass of uncontrollable frizzy curls.

"At least I've got hair!"

Annabelle giggles, flopping back onto her mattress.

"Give over, these plugs were dead expensive."

Her Dad waves his hand over his gradually receding hair, before catching her off guard with a stealth rib tickle, Annabelle snickers, chortles and gasps.

"_I want to see Dan."_

She says when her laughter has finally subsided. The happy expression written across her Father's face suddenly becomes static, she grips his hand.

"I don't think I will want to see him again, so it will be like a good-bye."

"You don't have to do this Annie, no-one is ever going to stop you from seeing Dan if that's what you want."

_This is the best thing._

This is the only thing, Annabelle corrects herself.

But that thought doesn't help to ease the ball of guilt that now seems to be weighting heavily in the pit of her stomach.

_Why? _What will really change in her life if she never sees Dan again? It will make her parents happy.

_Will it make her happy?_

Her Dad fixes her with another probing stare, which serves to unsettle Annabelle's fractured nerves further still.

It seems as if he is in the point of speaking, he opens his mouth, and then closes it again, before finally saying.

"_Alright, I'll have a talk with your Mum."_


	5. Chapter 5

The pain in his chest won't go away. The chill seems to invade him from the inside out, cruel and cold spine tingling fingers jabbing at his heart.

He clears his throat, and then suddenly thinks better of it, because the act draws attention to him, and all he wants to do now is crawl into the darkest of corners.

Then again this is the darkest of corners, and that's why they're here.

He can't bring himself to say the words, which even now are threatening to spill off the tip of his tongue.

_Are you dumping me?_

The silence is deafening.

"Daniel."

He tries not to hear his name, he just stares at the damp dirt floor watching as their shadows cross each other.

"_Just fuck off, yea."_

He spits.

This is the last time he will ever let himself feel like this, no-one else is ever going to touch him.

He hears a rustle of movement, and then a sharp intake of breath.

_Don't let it be Claire._

Glancing quickly over his shoulder he sees the outline of a third person.

He's had his heart stamped on like an old _Coke _can in one of the derelict out houses, that sit at the bottom of the field behind his house. It hadn't seemed that dark at first when it had been just the two of them, but now he can see the blistering light of the bright summer's day invading through the doorway, and he's eyes take a few moment to adjust to the transition.

Kate is caught in the doorway, the expression of a twisted 'oh' still clinging to her strawberry stained lips. She has the spirit of _Janis Joplin _about her today with her cut-off fraying jeans, home-made love beads, and uncontrollably frizzy hair.

"Hi, Mr Bennett."

The shock shifts from her face, and he can clearly see the hallmarks of her barely contained smirk tugging at the edges of her mouth.

"Hello, Kathryn."

Mr Bennett their teacher, or more importantly to him the man he has been seeing for the last three months greets Kate with a curt nod before casually brushing past her.

His heart starts to race, trilling through his veins pricking his skin with sudden heat and indecision. This is how he lives his life, constantly thinking about doing something, but never fulfilling the action. He wants to chase after _Mr Bennett, _he wants to ask him a million and one things, but most importantly he wants to know exactly what _fucking_ right, what entitlement _Mr Bennett _thinks he has to treat him like this.

The car pulls away, and after a few tattered heart beats it finally drifts out of sight over the hazy horizon.

"So you really weren't lying then, when you said you were shagging a teacher."

Kate's voice snaps the invisible cord of tension that had been coiled around his chest. He lets out a breath, and then wanders slowly in her direction.

"_Was."_

He frowns, as he leans against the rough splintered wood of the doorframe.

"Yes well, he is the hottest teacher in the _6__th__ form._"

He casts a harsh glance downward his brow twitching.

"Have you been watching _Neighbours,_ again?"

Kate glances up at him unashamedly, and for the very first time he notices just how big, and how green her eyes actually are.

He swallows thickly.

"Fuck off!"

She grimaces, and he suddenly finds himself starting to forget the dull ache that had been previously thudding away inside his chest.

"You're alright, though?"

Kate quizzes, her face becoming serious for a moment, the corners of her mouth slipping downwards briefly. He's often noticed that she smiles more than any other girl in his year, or even at his school. Vaguely he wonders if she ever gets tired of being so _happy_ all the time.

He shrugs his shoulders in response, for once words aren't enough to answer Kate's question, he's seventeen and he knows he probably should have felt like this before, at least once, but he never has, and the barbs and thorns prick at his overly sensitive skin.

Kate slips her arm between the crook of his own, he doesn't flinch from her touch instead he lets her familiar warmth penetrate deep.

"Do you think it was the stain that put him off?"

She jabs in the direction of the patch of overgrown fuzz above his upper lip. In hindsight growing the world's worst attempt at a moustache probably wasn't the best way of impressing your significantly older, married lover.

_Lover._

_Oh God, _he internally winches at that.

"Yeah, yeah, international let's take the piss out of _Dan, _have you got anything else or are you prepared to leave it there?"

Kate does something next that takes him completely by surprise she kisses him. It's not a proper kiss by any stretch of the imagination, he thinks she must have been aiming for his cheek, but catches the corner of his mouth instead. He feels Kate's smile against his lips.

This isn't the first kiss they have shared; Kate's lips for him at least have always had a strangely hypnotic quality, especially at the tail end of particularly drunken parties.

She is the one that lets him go, she pushes him lightly away without the slightest hint of self-consciousness or embarrassment.

"You're Dad told me to come and find you,"

Kate tells him, space growing between them.

"...he requires your arse back home, and that you can't get out of helping him."

Her fingers find the thick string of multi-coloured beads hanging down from around her neck, he watches as she twists the end of her necklace loosely around her thumb.

"_Right."_

He mumbles deflated, been dumped is one thing having to help his Dad once again attempt to paint the guttering at the back of their house is another, manual labour isn't one of those things he has ever excelled at.

"Oh Dan, don't be such a pain in the bum, just go and help your Dad."

He's not comfortable with anyone knowing him that well, he doesn't like the idea of being some sort of easily readable stereotype.

Message apparently successfully relayed Kate spins on her heels, and starts to leave humming the opening bars of _Piece of my heart_.

"So, that's it then?"

He calls after her.

"Yep, that's it."

She answer back, flicking his a single cheeky backwards glance over her shoulder. He waits a few minutes before following her back.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"_Annie."_

His eyes open, and in the haze of confusion all he can see is white.

Hard, white above him.

Through all his numbness he can feel the familiar distant hiss of various chemicals coursing along his blood stream. His whole body seems to be made up completely of static, heavy and light at the same time.

And that hard, white shell still looms over him.

Annabelle's face moves into his line of sight, her feature blurred slightly, so that it seems as if her eyes are blue instead of green, and her hair dark brown rather than golden blonde.

"_Annie."_

"No, no Dan...it's me...it's Claire."

Darkness threatens to engulf him completely for a moment, he struggles back up to the surface. The sudden and almost unbearable screech of noise greets him making him think suddenly of _Jones..._

"It's alright Dan, I sent Jones a text he's going to meet us at the hospital."

_The hospital._

He seeps back into whirling screams, and cobalt blue, and realises that he's in the back of an ambulance.

_It isn't his first time..._

xxxxxxxxxxxx

Here the night smells like idiots.

A toxic mix of overripe plastic kebab boxes, cigarette butts, sticky alchopops, and piss, a magic combination, which never fails to irritate his nose and set his teeth on edge.

He knows he must be getting older, _old, _because he's reached the point in life where thoughts of nostalgia, of his own rose tinted, overly sentimentalised past serve as a perpetual compass for the present.

For instance, now when he lets his mind drift back over the nocturnal smells of his youth the constant belch and grime of the city is replaced by damp grass, and bonfire smoke.

He thinks about _them._

About Kate and his daughter. Surprisingly he does this quite a lot, often he finds himself picturing them in various imagined domestic scenarios, in which his role is unclear.

A grey area of ambiguity surrounds his feeling for both of them. Biology has some part to play in his consideration of Annabelle.

_Consideration__,_ even uttered in the confines of his own head that word sounds terrible.

He finishes what's left of the roll-up he managed to cage from an inebriated passer-by, and after another brief moment of reflection he pushes against the heavy black doors of the fire escape exist.

The noise hits him first, an audible assault as painful as any fist in the face.

He expected it too all be over by now, it was the reason he'd been loitering outside resembling a tramp on the hunt for change.

Elbowing his way efficiently to the front of the queue for the bar he pours out the money he collected from the floor outside from his jacket pockets, depositing it in a puddle of stale beer drenching his sleeves.

Without hesitation he orders a double vodka to be accompanied by a wedge of lemon, clearly displaying his concern of late regarding scurvy.

He receives his drink in the goblet of an idiot, but consoles himself with the knowledge that vodka is vodka, and merciful oblivion is only another six or seven shots away.

The chance of any form of release or enjoyment is unfairly denied him, as a jolt from the side over balances his arm costing him most of what had been in his glass.

"_Cunt__ing twat!" _

Doesn't seem at all a good enough insult to cover the rage, and turmoil he is currently experiencing.

"Alright, mate."

He hears the voice belonging to the shove, it has the high tones of a twenty-something male with a thick Croydon based slur.

His vision shifts to the corner of his eye, he angry stares at the man standing next to him. The man might as well have _idiot _written all over his body, from the ridiculous gel slicked multi-coloured tufts of hair at the top of his air filled head, to his spray on jeans which make him appear every inch the posturing anorexic. He also notes the fact that the man's garish t-shirt has sleeves, and that his emaciated appearance may have more to do with chemicals, than just being too stupid to eat.

He wants another drink, and it seems only fair that The Shove should be the one to cough up for it.

"I want a double vodka."

He doesn't bother to disguise the edge in his voice he wants The Shove to hear it.

"_Water, yea!"_

The Shove gestures to the _idiot _serving at the bar, The Shove is unsurprisingly completely oblivious to his demand.

He decides to change tack ever so slightly, reasoning that shouting simply won't penetrate he ops for a combination of close proximity and abuse.

"Listen you failed abortion, I want a drink in my hand, now."

That seems to garner some attention as the next thing he sees are a pair of wide, slightly dilated blue eyes. _Nice eyes_, he thinks before quickly erasing the thought along with another, which consisted of the idea that The Shove might have been planning to follow up with a punch. And even though he looks every inch the sort of man who should easily be able to fend of the feeble attentions of such a _pipsqueak_ he knows he'd actually lose, and lose badly.

He blinks feeling something cold, and wet filling his grasp he stares down at the pint glass of water innocently holding his gaze.

"What the _fuck_ is this?"

"That's a drink, you wanted one, and now you've got it so piss of yea."

The Shove answers with all the simplicity he is clearly capable of.

"You absolute _shit-box_!"

The white hot bubble of range, which has been threatening to spill over for weeks suddenly explodes inside him with all the force of a silently, deadly pent up volcano.

"You might want to keep off the hard stuff for like an hour, or whatever. Give your liver a rest, like."

His head spins once at the idea that even a confirmed _idiot _can spot his alcoholic's pallor. Quickly he strikes another thought, and replaces it with an excuse, or to him at least the truth, _he drinks so much because he hates his life, he hates the world he feels that he had been condemned to exist in, but he doesn't know what the fuck could ever make any of it better. _

He has the sickening pulse again, which vibrates deep inside his core, _not soul never soul_, soon he thinks he will die.

_No_, what he actually knows is soon he might just kill himself.

Even here, even in this space cluttered up by so many other people, he feels the icy fingered tingle of knowledge tracing up his spine. He's back standing on the platform transfixed by the black void of twisted metal and track, the urge to jump tricks away inside of him as the toes of his trainers kiss the very edge of the yellow warning line. In the end he pulls back, he always pulls back, only ever half serious in the first place, but someday one day he knows he won't be able to, he won't want to stop himself from plummeting forward.

He must have been standing there rooted to the spot for quite sometime because The Shove now has his back to him, arrogant _shit-rat_. He knows time is running out from him to come back with a stunning retort, the comeback to put the little shit firmly back in his putrid place.

For once the countered his weighted firmly in his favour, when a disembodied voice bellows out the name _Jones _over the throbbing base_, _and The Shove or the poncy Hoxton severely under talented DJ he has come to review to give him his proper prefix reacts.

"DJ Jones."

He sniggers relishing the opportunity to twist the knife deep into the back of an _idiot_, who for the time being can stand in for the collective group.

"What?"

Jones snorts.

He pulls his laminated press pass out of his pocket, and casually dangles it under the younger man's angular nose. With a great deal of pleasure he watches Jones' face twist in realisation, and then horror.

"You're Dan Ashcroft, the geezer who's reviewing my gig?"

He can see the bubble of panic quickly swelling up inside Jones, his wide eyes are full of desperation. For that look alone he is more than happy to forgo the pay, which reviewing the poxy gig would have adequately provided. He live on baked beans and whiskey for another two weeks.

"I'll review your gig live for you right now, if you want?"

He ruefully smirks at the flicker of hope Jones is suddenly wearing.

"Yea genius, sorry about the bit before with the drink, I'm a dick head."

Jones' demeanour changes, the mask of practiced nonchalance and over-confidence slip away replaced by a nervous ruffle of hair.

For some unknown reason he suddenly delights in the idea of tormenting the younger man.

"You want some of my words."

He smiles exposing his yellowed canines, his small eyes darted towards the smooth curve of Jones' neck. He feels his _adam's apple_ dip as he involuntarily swallows, his saliva thickly slips down the back of his throat.

"Absolute piddle."

He whispers softly, so close that he can feel the heat reradiating from Jones' body, soaking through his t-shirt.

It takes a few seconds for the information to disseminate, but when it finally does Jones' face drops.

"_You..."_

The younger, smaller man mumbles, betraying his knowledge of exactly what a bad review in a good magazine will do for a fledging career.

In the end he doesn't need the finally passing shot, it's just enough to know that he's destroyed an _idiot. _For the first time in the long time he leaves a place more satisfied than when he entered it. On nights like this the world for once is a close approximation to perfect.

Much later after he has finished off another can of cheap Dutch lager that he realises he's left his press pass in the clutches of the _idiot _dubbed Jones.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

He is leaning against the rough graffiti splattered brick wall, silently lamenting the passing of the freedom to smoke in one's own office, when he hears his name. It doesn't register at first, the familiarity of those harmonious Croydon tones.

"_Oi Ashcroft!"_

The sun is blazing, and almost directly obscuring the line of his view, even if he could see the figure approaching him clearly he's not sure he would really want to, he can tell from the aggressive stance nothing good is heading his way.

His head is sore, and the back of his throat feels scratchy and dry, lasting tokens from the night before, his hollow victory.

"Are you deaf?"

Jones appears next to him with a clear disregard for personal space.

"Look I don't want any trouble, alright."

The words leave his body in a half-hearted attempt at self-defence, he knows that Jones hasn't suddenly appeared for a fight. On the inside he's rolling his eyes at the tedium of what will come next the angsty pleading.

His eyes follow Jones hand as he begins to pull something out of the back pocket of his truly horrendous skinny jeans, another derivative neon flyer no doubt advertising another club night in some vomit filled part of the East End. What Jones finally presents to him however is something altogether different a plain black plastic memory stick.

"I've done your review."

He's completely speechless, even his stream of constant inner dialogue falters.

"_You..."_

He finds himself mirroring the younger man's response from the previous night. The attitude of gormlessness invades his very being, he clearly notes that his upper and lower rows of teeth are no longer touching.

Jones is the picture of smugness, the confidence levels clearly back up to maximum. Jones looks different under the blaze of the sun, the clashing mixture of scarlet and bleached highlights catch the light and gleam. He is an odd looking young man, his long nose and large eyes a little too much for his face, he could never be classed as handsome by conventional standards. But there is something, a cheeky luminous quality that makes it hard to avert the gaze from DJ Jones' distinct profile.

"I've kept it relatively impartial,"

Jones grins transferring the USB into his sweaty grasp.

"After you've had a read, I'll be in the pub you can buy me a lemonade."


	6. Chapter 6

Annabelle doesn't know exactly what is meant to be happening, but she's sure that whatever it is this isn't it. She half expected for everything to be over by now, for her to have made her trip to the hospital to see if Dan was still alive, and that if he was well enough to tell him that she doesn't want to see him anymore.

But now everything is moving so slowly, compared to the morning when it had seemed to take no time at all for her Dad to talk her Mum into taking the train to London, while he volunteered to stay behind at home with Tiger.

Even the journey to London past quicker than it usual, mainly because Tiger hadn't been attempting to break free from the confines of his seat, or running up and down the aisle annoying the other passengers. It was nice just for once not having the constant interruption of a 'little person', Annabelle watched the green patchwork scenery rolling past her window listening to her _Ipod, _drawing the occasional condensation related flower, while her Mum successfully made it half way into the battered old copy of _4.50 From Paddington _she's been attempting to read on and off for the last two years.

On their way down to London her Mum received two text messages, the first one had been from her Dad, Annabelle could tell from the quirk of the barest smile that had appeared in the corner of her Mum's mouth, but the second had been from someone else, and had come much later, the second was the reason they weren't at the hospital, it 's the reason why Annabelle is now sitting on the sofa her Mum has never liked in the living room/kitchen diner of the flat her Dad uses for work on the weekends.

Annabelle has never felt entirely comfortable in this place, it's an odd little flat packed to the gunnels with questionable purchases, and various dust collecting objects they have collectively grown out of as a family. The best example of this can be found in the bedroom that Annabelle shares with her younger brother whenever they have cause to spend the night in the Capital, stuffed away in one corner of the room, which can barely manage to contain a bunk bed, are the wooden slats and numerous other odds and ends, which once made up the solid foundations of Tiger's cot. In her humble, and often overlooked opinion, unless her parents are considering a surprise baby in the immediate future they should defiantly give it away to a charity shop where it won't be able to stub quite so many toes.

This is also the place where her Mum stores her paintings before they are sold off over the internet, her Mum might never have opened a gallery, but her work is commercially successful, and more importantly than that Annabelle actually likes it. Her parents actually met the first time at art school, where her Dad failed to become an artist, and turned his hand to journalism instead. They still reminisce enthusiastically about a compost bin, which they fashioned with the aid of their Australian flat mate from left over bits of chicken wire and bamboo.

"Would it kill your Father to run a cloth around a mug once in a while?"

Annabelle doesn't know, at home they have a dishwasher.

"Well, I'm not cooking here its unhygienic, do you fancy a pizza? Or we could go out, there's a nice Mexican place on the high street."

She considers her Mum's statement for a moment the clouds of confusion gathering once again.

"I thought we were going to the hospital to see Dan?"

The whitening of her Mum's knuckles is the only thing that betrays her obvious inner turmoil.

"_Okay,"_

Her Mum whispers softly, before taking up the vacant space next to Annabelle on the sofa.

_I got a text from Aunty Claire__..._

It takes him a while to locate the right pub, and then find Jones, after reading the review he does owe him a lemonade.

He hates being surprised by anyone it makes him feel nervous, serving to remind him of the last great surprise of his life.

Although the sentence structure needs to be tightened, and the tenses changed in some places, he can't bring himself to deny that the preening boy Jones has a skill with words, and a sense of witty humour that beguiles what's on the outside.

More than that, and something which he has never strove for, or ever managed to achieve when he has, in print Jones is likeable. The likeability literally leaps off from the page engaging with the reader, he has never once laughed in his office, but today he has, twice.

When he sees Jones he's sat at a small circular table underneath an open window, with a half empty glass of transparent liquid, eating what appears to be a peach.

On closer inspection the fruit turns out to be a nectarine.

"Alright."

He clears his throat and replies, before sitting down at the table opposite the younger man.

"So, you read it then."

Jones' quizzes his mouth full, his gaze entranced by gibberish scrawled in biro across the beer mat under his finger tips.

"Did you write this?"

He asks without the pretence of a preamble, having already decided that Jones with his child-like enthusiasm cannot be the author of the now printed pages he is holding out in his left hand.

Jones glances up fixing his wide stare on the pieces of paper.

"I wrote the stuff that was on the USB, was that on there?"

He feels himself nodding, Jones grins back before turning his attention away again.

"No wait, you wrote this yourself? _You_, actual you, wrote all the words I'm holding in my hand?"

He has the irrepressible need to hit his head against something hard repeatedly. His skin crawls at the idea of being tied up in knots by any _idiot_.

"I don't believe you."

His statement fails to provoke any emotional reaction from Jones, who simply washes what is left of the nectarine down with the last of his drink. Jones wipes his mouth on the back of his hand, dropping the fruit's stone in a nearby ashtray.

"To be honest mate, I don't really give a shit what you believe; as long as you print the review of my gig in your magazine, I'll be stellar."

He feels suddenly wrong footed.

"The magazine won't be able to print the article if you didn't write it."

Jones makes a move to get up clutching at his empty glass.

"We'll I didn't write it did I, you did."

Jones slips past him in one fluid motion, his eyes follow him magnetized as the younger man made his way over to the bar. He waits a beat, and then follows.

The girl behind the bar is looking at Jones with a weary sneer, he's seen that expression usually directed at him, it's born from the derision of serving a customer who is never going to set the till on fire with ringing.

"I'll get these."

He volunteers, quickly fumbling through his pockets desperately hunting for anything approaching legal tender. With his elbow resting against the bar Jones shrugs his shoulders.

"If you're buying I'll have a lemon and lime, zero ice."

He catches Jones eye with an expression of something approaching mild horror, he supposes.

"Look, don't take the piss. I've got money if that's the problem, I can buy you a pint."

"No, you don't."

Jones shoots back referring to his obvious lack of finances.

"You offered me a drink yea, I told you what I wanted. Just bring it back over to the table, I'm going for a slash."

His cheeks burn, as Jones leaves his side shuffling off in what he can only imagine is the direction to the gents.

When he eventually receives the drinks he ordered a lemon and lime, and a double vodka Jones is already perched back at the table his face buried between the printed pages of a newspaper.

"Fuck, she took her time didn't she?"

Jones comments, a lop-sided smirk playing across his features as he pushes the newspaper to one side in favour of his drink.

"I think I believe you."

Jones' face contorts at the taste of the bitter lime cordial.

"Yea okay, as I said before I could care less, I just need gigs and readies to stop my landlord from kicking my head in. You gonna print it?"

He takes a sip from his own glass, the familiar burn racing its way down the back of his throat.

"You're a cocky shit."

He huffs, genuinely amused by the younger man. It strikes him suddenly that he enjoys talking to Jones.

"Yea, but I'm pretty with it."

He raises an eyebrow, but says nothing.

"It needs some cleaning up before I submit it to my editor."

Just as it had the night before Jones' exterior cracks slightly, revealing the failure of a boy who doesn't take criticism very well.

"I thought you, I mean you seemed to think it was good."

"It is, but it still needs some work, and my editor likes to edit, it'll give him something to do other than shove coke up his snout."

He sees Jones twitch slightly, his original hunch revealing itself to be a truth.

"So, did they make you go to rehab?"

Everything is gone after that, the final pretence shattered, the mood in the room dips and darkens.

"Thanks for the drink."

Jones gets to his feet abruptly, sinking the contents of his glass in one gulp, a few stray strands of liquid dribble down the faint stubble of his chin.

He's overstepped the mark, the feeling of disappointment threatens to overwhelm him because he knows with an almost sickening certainty that he's never going to see Jones again.

His eyes widen to almost comical cartoon-like proportions at the shape of the letters sprayed over the door in front of him. The name depicted in yellow neon paint is a common enough one, but there is no mistaking whose house he has wandered into the territory of.

He clutches at the small advertising card he pulled from the notice board of his cornershop, until thirty minutes ago he'd been completely unaware that people still advertised such things in any format other than on the internet.

The add was simple and direct, one person to share a flat, must be employed with no pets, but it failed to stipulate smoking habits, a prerequisite for him when renting is the ability to smoke within the confines of his hovel.

He bangs his fist repeatedly against the door until the music emanating from inside suddenly halts; he's using the term 'music' loosely to describe the disjointed mess of noise.

He feels himself tensing, his throat constricting as the door opens. Jones appears leaning against the rotten doorframe wearing another one of his long sleeved jumpers.

"Are you following me?"

Jones grins, his tongue wedged firmly in his cheek.

He's smiling back.

"I think you're the one who is trying to lure me in."

Jones makes no immediate comment, picking at a few stay strands of cotton unravelling from the edge of one of his sleeves.

"You're here about the room, yea?"

He makes a grunt of non-commitment, which leaves his body with a wheeze. He's on the defensive as Jones falls into another unnatural bout of silence.

"You best come in then."

Jones flashes him an irrepressible smile, which cuts through the lingering effects of his hangover. He reminds himself that he's not a real alcoholic, one day he'll stop drinking, no one day he'll drink vintage wines with expensive labels for pleasure and not just mindless obliteration.

He steps over the narrow threshold following Jones into a small dingy hallway, hovering above them he can see the outline of a brown carpeted staircase. They don't linger long the younger man quickly leads him into a larger living space, which is filled with two sofas, a kitchen with a breakfast bar, mixing decks and vinyl records, many stacks of vinyl records. The only thing that retains a hold on his attention is the large canvas self-portrait of Jones, he doesn't know whether to burst into a fit of laughter or turn of the heels on his worn out trainers and run.

In the end he does neither, he simply stands in the middle of the room silently observing.

"This is the downstairs, yea; my bedroom is upstairs, with the bog and that. I work at night yea, so I'll be mostly out, but when I'm in I'll be mixing."

Jones explains in a flurry, sounding every inch the _idiot_ twat he first appears.

"And the room for rent is upstairs as well?"

He enquires, trying to keep his voice as natural and neutral as possible, attempting to mask his desperation.

"Okay about the room,"

Jones takes a breath.

"How often have you got cash on you?"

A familiar sinking feeling washes over him.

_Never_, should be his answer. He should then go further to explain the duel reasons behind his constantly empty pockets, usually he pisses any money he ever has up against the nearest wall, and when not engaged in that he stares at his computer paralysed by bouts of chronic laziness.

"All the time. Look can I just see the room."

"Yea, that's what I thought."

Jones mutters knowingly.

"Alright the thing is yea, there is no room. You can kip on that sofa,"

Jones singles out one of the two sofas with his index finger.

"...when you've got money you can pay me."

It takes him a few moments to digest the offer fully.

"Are you sub-letting?"

Jones' answer comes in the form of a shrug. He doesn't need to think about this, he's got no references and no stable income; basically he's got no choice it's this or moving back in with his parents.

"Fuck it, alright fine."

He eyes his designated sofa nervously, reminding himself that he's had worst beds.

"Can I move in today?"


End file.
